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Health & Fitness

Examining Newark's Checkered Past on Slavery at Arts High

Arts High Students in my class are frequently surprised to learn that the Brick City was no warm host for those who opposed slavery and embraced racial equality before the Civil War...

Newark’s Arts High students, like many of the college students I teach in the evening, are always surprised when we get to the unit on slavery. This is primarily due to the fact that in the elementary grades, black slavery and the movements to promote and defeat it are taught largely from an emotional standpoint. Most, if not all students would tell you (at least until they get to my class) that those who struggled against it were the equivalent of angels, and only demonic forces defended America’s “peculiar institution.” While I certainly hold that slavery in any form is regressive and evil, when it comes to those who argued over it in Newark’s history, the situation becomes much grayer. The facts, at least concerning the Brick City, present us with more or less of an intricate tapestry of ideas, interests and causes.

 

Newark’s history is American history, and black slavery was one of the major forces that built this nation, North and South. Black slaves contributed to Newark’s growth. Black slaves picked the cotton that got shipped to northern factories (the same factories that employed Newark’s growing immigration population) and manufactured it into clothing and other textiles. Newark leather-makers (tanners) transformed cowhide into specially designed whips that were sold by the thousands to slave masters and overseers in the South.

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The role of black slavery was so interwoven in national life that the original Constitution recognized and rewarded its growth in three clauses no less. The Three-Fifths Clause rewarded white slave-owners with increased political power in Congress. The Fugitive Slave Clause provided escaped slaves with no haven in the so-called “free” states. And most infamously, the 1808 Clause gave every white American the right to travel to Africa, and kidnap and import as many slaves as they wanted to.  

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The debate over slavery had been present in Colonial America; the first “abolitionists” were Quakers. But the movement to ban slavery only entered the American political mainstream in the 1830’s and 40’s. Students are always fascinated to find out that here in Newark the abolitionist movement was not universally supported, frequently opposed, and complex within itself.

 

In the 1830’s, Newark’s abolitionist movement was a far cry from the “freedom and equality now” activists of later decades. It was primarily comprised of white supremacists that detested human bondage but in no way embraced the ideal of racial equality. To promote their aims, 80 of Newark’s top politicians and clergymen founded the Newark Colonization Society (NCS) during this period.

 

The NCS was part of a broader “colonization” movement that was sweeping abolitionist circles in the 1830’s. For its members, the abolition of slavery was not enough; America was and would always be no place for free African-Americans. Instead, ex-slaves should be sent “back” to Africa. While it was true that by 1830 an overwhelming majority of African-Americans nationwide were not from there, this made little difference. NCS members gathered together, raised funds, and traveled to distant places like Liberia and Sierra Leone where, in their view, the foundations of an alternate “United States,” albeit comprised purely of former slaves, would be established.

 

A quick glance at one NCS meeting in July of 1838 displays the seriousness and enthusiasm of some of the city’s most prominent personalities. The society was quickly adding members, and membership required a large financial obligation. Additionally, several associates had recently returned from Liberia in Western Africa to report on the condition of the land and the local population. While we know today that life was extremely harsh in Liberia at this time (and still is, actually), the travelers publicized Liberia as a new Garden of Eden. One traveler claimed to have never seen a drunken man in Liberia, and that “the soil is fertile and easily tilled.” NCS members were also told that Liberia was a place where “men live and thrive there by moral character...” and “…the means of education are abundantly provided…the Sabbath too is universally and religiously observed.” Eventually, Liberia would become an independent country, ironically dominated by an exclusive group comprised of the descendants of American slaves at the expense of inland African tribes.

 

Newark had its outright, radical abolitionists, but a large portion of the city’s population clearly didn’t welcome them. How unwelcome were they? Well, in 1834, when a Protestant reverend tried to preach a sermon titled “A Discourse on the Sin of Slavery” in a church near Market Street, the results were calamitous. Just a few minutes into the sermon, the hall was surrounded by hundreds of pro-slavery activists who disrupted the ceremony and tore the room apart. These same men also attempted to harm the lone African-American in attendance, but luckily this person was, in the words of the Newark Daily Advertiser, “rescued” and spirited away by a group of young white abolitionists.

 

Newark’s pro-slavery movement was strong and visibly in the open by the 1830’s. The city, as I wrote earlier, had been a major beneficiary of black slavery, even though slavery itself was dying in New Jersey by this time. City factory owners and tanners whipped up racist sentiment amongst their mostly immigrant workers. Racial hatred was coupled with the claim that if slavery was ever abolished, millions of free blacks would rush north and undercut what was known as the “white wage.” To a recently arrived European immigrant living paycheck-to-paycheck, this was a terrifying prospect.

 

Pro-slavery residents were well organized. Local papers of the late 1830’s report that one local group included no less than the city’s mayor, several factory owners and some of their employees and apprentices.

 

In the end, like most New Jersey cities and towns, radical abolitionism never prevailed politically, not even in the year or two before the Civil War. Newark was no Boston. A quick glance at area newspapers from the early 1860’s tell of many mass rallies against secession and treason, but not one (that I could find) against slavery. In this respect, Newark’s sentiments concerning slavery were about the same as Lincoln’s early in the Civil War. Lincoln, “The Great Emancipator,” said on several occasions in the war’s first year that the struggle was not about liberating slaves. It was about preserving the Union.

 

Newark’s record on black slavery is a complex one. Before the Civil War, its citizens were all over the map on whether or not the practice should continue. To look upon these citizens as plainly “good” or “evil” is misleading. I try to impart to my students that life was complex and the fortunes of the city’s residents were interwoven in convoluted economic, religious and sectional forces. So while we might not agree with everyone's choices, we should, as educated people, try to understand their motivations. The final question I have them consider will be the subject of a future blog: are we, as a modern, so-called “connected” people, much different on the hot-button issues of today? 

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